a great book about the Lewis and Clark Expedition.

Just checked out the description and reviews and I think he'll like it. It's in my cart.

per this particular jail's regulations. For used books, the order has to be fulfilled/shipped by Amazon, not the third party seller. It's a PITA.

All Amazon's used offerings of In Cold Blood ship by the seller. Ugh. It's $12 new, which isn't awful, but I've been trying to keep in the under $10 range for each book.

I'm going to keep and eye on the used listings- maybe one will ship through Amazon.

They aren't even allowed to have the original letters that are sent- each page is xeroxed and the original shredded. It's to prevent drug smuggling.

The only other thing I can send is one food package per month, which has to be ordered through the company the jail uses for commissary. There's a $70 limit per package, which doesn't buy much. The portions are tiny and cost an arm and a leg.

Jail is such a freaking racket. I've had to sign up for 3 separate services, all from private companies: phone, the food package place, and to deposit money in his account (they take a 10% fee out of each deposit).

Not sure if he's read it, will ask next time he calls. Thanks!

Tampa area. I really enjoyed it because many of the places described I had been to as a child. A good read. It also has some good insights on what the local politics were like in those days.

Tom Davis (of Franken and Davis) wrote an autobiography just before he died. Very frank and open. Great stories about Franken, Aykroyd, and Jerry Garcia. Davis was best friends with Jerry.

There's a fairly recently book by Che Guevara called "Motorcycle" about his trip with a friend all over South and Central America. They were in their mid 20's and both took off from their medical career/education.

Of course there's also Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance which is supposed to be really good.

THIS I have read and it's really good. It's a parallel story of Meyer Lansky and Fidel Castro.
Lansky had his eye on Cuba going back to when he was running penny pitching in NYC.
The Cuban Revolution was really a comedy of errors (every major operation failed miserably) until they ran out of places to hide and said "What the hell. Let's go into Havana".


TJ English - who seems to specialize in mafia and underworld books.

The Frank Sinatra orgy interrupted by a Girl Scout and nuns!?


Plus the history sounds fascinating. It's on my list for his next shipment. Thanks!

Amazing book. Reads like a thriller, though non-fiction.

Beginning in the summer of 1903, an insidious crime wave stirred New York City, then the entire country, into panic. The children of Italian immigrants were being kidnapped and dozens of innocent victims gunned down. Bombs tore apart tenement buildings. Judges, senators, Rockefellers, and society matrons were threatened with gruesome deaths. The perpetrators’ only calling card: the symbol of a black hand.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/1328911195/ref=tmm_fbs_pap_title_0?ie=UTF8&qid=1556494604&sr=8-1

The Devil in the White City -- Erik Larson
Thunderstruck -- Erik Larson
Mothman Prophecies -- John Keel
The Boys in the Boat -- Daniel Brown
Seabiscuit -- Laura Hillenbrand

take a look at the books by Candice Millard.

River of Doubt is about a trip ex president Teddy Roosevelt took to the Amazon after he left office.

Destiny of the Republic is about the assassination of President Garfield.

Hero of the Empire is about Winston Churchill and the Boer War.

I've actually only ever read Destiny, but it's among the very best books I've ever read. Eventually I'll get to the others.

As far as the very best book I have ever read in my entire life, it's Prairie Fires: The American Dreams of Laura Ingalls Wilder by Caroline Fraser. I suppose I'm biased because I started reading the Little House books when I was about 8, I've reread them many times, and have read the earlier biographies of Laura. This one blows every other one out of the water. It gives a brief history of the Ingalls and Quiner families (her father's and mother's respectively) and then launches into a full and critical biography of Laura. Wow. It won the Pulitzer Prize for biography. Well deserved.

Fraser is also the author of God's Perfect Child: Living and Dying in the Christian Science Church which I've also read and is likewise excellent.

I happen to be very aware that books to prisons in at least some states require they come from Amazon, and I know people will get tripped up because they don't always realize that the book they're ordering from Amazon comes from a third party.

Let us know when you need more suggestions.

The Motorcycle Diaries by Che Guevara
Hell's Angel's by Hunter S. Thompson
China Underground by Zachary Mexico
The Men Who Stare at Goats by Jon Ronson
My Bloody Life by Reymundo Sanchez
No One Gets Out of Here Alive by Danny Sugarman, Jerry Hopkins
Playing Dead by Elizabeth Greenwood
Public Enemies by Bryan Burroughs
The Radium Girls by Kate Moore
Rising Out of Hatred by Eli Saslow
The Road to Jonestown by Jeff Guinn
Salt Sugar Fat by Michael Moss
Travels with Charley by John Steinbeck
Walking to the Moon by Chris Campion
Wild by Cheryl Strayed
Jimi Hendrix by Sharon Lawrence